The diamond drill. (Crystal Falls, Iron County, Mich.) 1887-1996, 1887-04-30


secret plot the ruin Of All the enter
prisesof Satan and his cohorts. When
they Expect us by day we will fall
upon them by night. While they are
Strengthening their left wing we viii
double up their right. BY a plan of
battle formed In secret conclave we
viii come suddenly upon them crying:
The sword of the Lord and Gideon.
Secrecy of plot and execution are
wrong only when the object and ends
are nefarlous. Every family is
secret society, every business firm and
every banking and insurance institu-
ton. Those men who have no capac-
ity to keep a secret are unfit for posi-
tons of trust anywhere. There are
thousands of men whose vital need Is
culturing a capacity TO keep secret.
Men talk too much, and women too.
There is time 10 keep silence as well
as time 10 speak.
Although not belonging TO any Of
the great secret societies about which
there has been SO much violent discus
sion, have only words OF praise for
those associations which have for
their object the maintenance OF right
against wrong, or the reclamation of
inebriates, or, like the score of mutual
benefit societies called by different
names, that provide temporary relief
for widows and orphans and for men
( incapacitated by sickness or accident
from earning livelihood. Had it not
been for the large number of secret
labor organizations in this country
monopoly would long ago have, under
its ponderous wheels, ground the labor
ing classes into an intolerable seryi-
tude.
The men who want the whole earth
20 themselves would have GOT IL long
before this had it not been for the
banding together Of great secret or
CARNATIONS. And, while we deplore
many things that have been done by
them, their existence is a necessity,
and their legitimate sphere distinctly
pointed out by the providence OF God.
Such organizations are trying TO dis
miss from their association all mem
bers in favor of anarchy and social
chaos. They will gradually cease any
thing like tyranny over their members,
and will forbid violent interference
with any mans work, whether he be-
belongs 20 their union or is outside of
IL, and will declare their disgust with
any such rule as that passed in Eng
land by the Manchester Bricklayers'
Association, which says any man
found running or working beyond a
certain speed shall be fined Is Cd for
the first offense, IS for the second, los
for the third, and If still perssting,
shall be dealt with as the committee
think proper.
There are secret societies in our col
leges that have letters of the Greek
alphabet for their nomenclature, and
their members are at the very front In
scholarship and irreproachable in NOR
ais, while there are others the scene of
carousal, and they gamble, and they
drink. and they graduate knowing
hundred times more about sin than
they do of geometry and Sophocles.
In other words, secret societies, like
individuals, are good or bad are the
means of moral health, or of temporal
and eternal damnation. All good peo-
pie recognize the vice OF slandering an
individual. but many do not see the
sin Of slandering an organization.
There are old secret societies in this
and other countries, some OF them cen
turtles old, which have been widely de-
nounced as immoral and damaging in
their influence, yet | have hundreds Of
personal friends belonging TO them,
friends who are consecrated 20 God,
pillars in the church, faithful in all re-
lations Of life, examples of virtue and
piety. They are the kind Of friends
whom | would have for my executors
If am SO happy as TO leave anything
for my household at the time of de-
cease, and they are the men whom |
would have carry me out TO the last
sleep when | am dead. You can not
make me believe that they would be.
long TO bad institutions. They are the
men who would stamp on anything in
iquitous. and would certainly rather
take their testimony in regard 20 such
societies than the testimony OF those
who, having been sworn in as mem
bers, by their assault upon the society.
confess themselves perjurers.
Bad societies make bad men. Good
societies make good men. A bad
man will not stay in good society.
A COOL man will not stay in bad
society. Then try all secret societies
by two or three rules